Fireside Whispers
by Minor God
Summary: A conversation omitted from the books.  Harry visits a guilt-racked Sirius after his harsh words in the fireplace, OotP.  Some self-harm themes.


A/N: Sirius reflects on his harsh words to Harry.

Disclaimer: This is me disclaiming.

Rating: T, for a few naughty words and self-harm.

"_You're less like your father than I thought. The risk would have been half the fun for James."_

A moment later, he pulled back from the fire and regretted it. He was alone again in his chilly prison with nothing to break the monotony except the deranged rumblings of Kreacher; now he'd really done it.

Hot tears of anguish ran down his face. _Why_ had Harry provoked him – why did Harry not want to see him? Of course he'd lashed out, he _lived_ for the bloody kid, his whole life was the space in between the owls from Hogwarts, his internment here was ultimately for the kid's safety and yet, Harry had told him not to come.

Immediately, he wanted to lean back into the fire. But what could he say? "Sorry about that, I'm going mad because I'm trapped in the setting of my abysmal childhood." Going? he asked himself bitterly. No, he could not go back on his words, he'd embarrassed himself too much. Oh, it ached again when he thought of it! What had he done? Defamed his miraculous, heroic, innocent Godson in front of his friends, he'd been a bloody fiend! Wait – was that it?

He drew back from the hearth and stood angrily as though confronting himself. Did Harry decline to see him because of his shortening temper? It was true he couldn't be much company; getting so lonely that even human company was loosing its appeal, every single voice and movement could overwhelm and annoy him. His moods and memories stalked him like a black cloud that he knew was palpable to all who saw him, and yet he could do nothing to dispel or apologise for it. Maybe Harry just didn't like him.

The angry tears waned into weeping. _Harry doesn't like me!_ There was nothing to do inside this house – this house that looked like the dark interior of his mind – except give way to melancholy: he tried to see how much he could bear. _My own Godson doesn't like me – doesn't love me. He hates me! My son hates me!_

To think that 18 months ago he'd dreamed of them together in a little detached house in a wizarding village, of being called Dad. This place made him sick, the bad memories growing on the walls like fungus, infecting him, growing poisonously beneath his skin. He was mad! Mad!

Just as he thought it, he walked to the wall and smacked his forehead on the rank, damp wallpaper. _Out_, he thought. A frustrated monosyllable to go with the injury. _Harry. James. James. Dead. Harry. James. Out. Out. Out. Out. Out._

"Sirius?" The voice was timid, but unmistakeable. Sirius turned to face his fifteen year-old Godson, newly stepped from the fireplace.

Harry faltered. What he had expected to find was Sirius brooding to Buckbeak and slightly haughty. What he found was a man flame-eyed with crying, and beating his head repeatedly against a wall. There was no drama or the passionate flare that he anticipated, just a mundane, painful _thud, thud, thud_. Without knowing what to do, Harry laid a hand on Sirius's shoulder and gently pulled him away from the wall. "Why are you hurting yourself?" he said in a very small voice.

Sirius looked blankly into his gaze. He knew that had he been on form he would have made a wicked joke about trying to knock the place down, tried not to trouble the boy with any more of the world's weight, but no humour came to him and he said blankly "Because I'm a bastard."

Harry had nothing to say, though his mouth had fallen open. With a gentleness Sirius wouldn't have credited to him, Harry reached up a hand to his Godfather's face and brushed the tears away. There was a sadness in his eyes that set Sirius's heart alight with guilt – how could he let Harry see him being so pitiful and self-indulgent?

His voice caught in his throat, he said "How did you get in?"

Harry said, "The floo network, from Snape's office, the twins are providing a distraction." They both very nearly smiled.

On appraisal, Sirius felt the sun come out a little around the black clouds of his mood. If Snape suspected Harry of using his fireplace, then Harry would have to stay until he thought the coast was clear; he also noticed that Harry was looking much healthier and livelier than when he first arrived from those dubious relatives of his. "I wanted to see you," the boy ventured, and it sounded all too like an apology. His eyes were wide as if in fright.

"Harry," mumbled Sirius, suddenly aware of the throbbing pain on his forehead, "I'm so sorry-"

"No," said Harry quickly, "I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I ought not to have-" Shadows closed in quickly. It was the horrific sadness that pervaded Azkaban, but clung to its only escapee like fatal perfume. The room seemed suddenly to darken and Harry to disappear, Sirius barely heard himself cry out…

When the clouds lifted, he was in the kitchen in a chair by the fireplace. Harry sat close by, still with his eyes wide like a frightened child. When he perceived that Sirius was looking at him lucidly once more, he gave a tentative smile. He poured tea for his Godfather, and for a while they drank in silence. To go back to that awful row did not seem safe, so Sirius said, "How is school?"

"Good," said Harry automatically. Then, "Sometimes. The new Defence teacher is insane, Dolores Umbridge. She gave me detention for not rolling over and saying Voldermort was dead and she won't let us learn about actual defences, we're just reading out of these ancient textbooks… And Snape gave me two detentions in the first week. Sometimes I wish – I wish I'd been expelled at that trial." They exchanged a glance and Sirius read it clearly: Harry wished he could have stayed here. At first this gave him a gleeful vindication, but the next moment it was overtaken by guilt.

"Hogwarts is a wonderful place," he said at last. "You don't want to be stuck here rattling around like a bird in a cage, this is no place for youth."

"But sometimes I do! When things at Hogwarts get unbearable I can't stop thinking about being here. I can't stand to think of you here on your own." Harry's voice cracked. His thoughts were occupied by the awful, incomprehensible sight that had met his eyes when he arrived: why had Sirius been beating himself against a wall? Was it because Harry had denied him the opportunity to leave the house? Was it, as he said, because Harry was not like James – because Harry was not James?

As if reading his thoughts, Sirius interrupted: "I am extremely sorry for what I said. I didn't mean a word of it. And even if I did, it's wrong of me to judge you against your father, when you've had to face so much more in your life. It's just, James and I were joined at the hip for ten years, and I still sometimes can't believe he's gone."

"Why did you say it?" asked Harry tremulously.

Sirius hung his head. "I… it was the heat of the moment. I wanted to see you so badly, and, like a fool, I thought you didn't want to see me."

"Of course I do!" Harry exclaimed. "That's why I came here!"

"I know, I know." With a little effort, Sirius raised himself from the chair and knelt down beside Harry with his arms about the boy's shoulders. Very rarely did they spend time alone together; signs of affection were sparse and precious. More grave than Sirius had ever seen him, Harry tenderly stroked the blossoming bruise on his Godfather's face. He knew Harry was burning to ask why he'd done it, but he resolved not to answer: there was pain and anger in the world that no-one of his age ought to understand – Harry had saved several lives, what did he know of guilt, or self-hatred? This was an unpleasant thought. Sirius drew himself up and began to wave his wand at the candles about the darkening room, lighting them, and smiled to Harry. "Snape will be expecting you back, won't he? What plans have you got?"

As he expected, Harry answered, "Er. Well I thought I could stay here til he goes to sleep."

This allowed Sirius to frown thoughtfully and say "Wouldn't it be easier if you stayed the night and slipped out when you know he'll be at breakfast? It'll save you getting caught sneaking round the castle at night."

To this, Harry had to agree. Sirius felt a rush of joy and began ecstatically to organise a platter of butterbeer and scones, which they ate in the drawing room serenaded by Sirius's old vinyl records. Eventually the tension that had pervaded the evening washed away; each was quietly glad for a chance to be alone with the other. When Harry asked again, his face painted by the red firelight, his voice soft in keeping with the sad seventies Muggle song, he added non-commitally: "I do stuff like that sometimes. I held my hand on the hob in the summer after Diggory died, and last year when I thought Ron didn't like me anymore, I stuck my compasses into my arm and ran them up and down. I was so angry I wanted to kill someone, but there was no-one to blame except me."

"Fuck," said Sirius, with an incredible, angry potency. Had he said it to Harry or himself, or the hearth he was gazing at? "Fuck," he repeated, this time, definitely to himself. He glanced up. "I'm sorry, Harry. I'm…" Something deep inside his eyes shifted, his voice fell. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't be sitting here pitying myself when you're-"

But Harry was not about to let this get buried under sympathy. "_Why_?" he urged. "What were you thinking?"

"I've gone way beyond thinking, Harry, I'm just a scrambled mess of frustration and the fact I killed my best friend and orphaned you. Frustration and guilt, that's it, they chase each other round my head all day and all night. And what I said. I've been a git, Harry, can you forgive me?"

"Yes," said Harry. And he'd never been so sure of anything before.

There was silence. "I don't think you're James," said Sirius finally. "I know you must think – what with everyone saying – but. I loved James like a brother and I love you like a son. If anything I feel guilty for trying to usurp his son, but I love you so much that-" Words failed him. His eyes glistened in the firelight; for the first time since Harry had known him, he looked sad and vulnerable. A strange mood crossed over Harry: Sirius was not in fact a super-human placed on Earth to protect him; Sirius was scarcely different in capabilities from himself, except in age, and that was frightening. He tried to imagine himself, starved and frail, swimming through the icy sea. Living off rats in a cave – actually to _feel_ the hunger necessary to eat rats... Wearing the same clothes for 12 years; never able to see or speak to a living soul, the dread of never seeing the sun again – A chill passed over him.

Sirius had endured so much, but it did not mean he was infallible. It could mean that his resources were running out: his temper, that faint aroma of gin, the idolatry of a dead friend. What if he was giving up?

He was about to speak, although he knew not what to say, when Sirius cut across him. "I don't like to think of you hurting yourself," he said sternly. "Do you do it often?"

Harry shook his head mutely. "Just when I lose control over everything. I don't sort of, _decide_ to do it, it just happens."

Softly, Sirius laid a claw-like hand on Harry's own. "You must decide _not_ to do it," he said, and his voice was so tender it was almost a whisper. "Having you healthy and happy is the most important thing to me in the whole world, I can't bear to think of you being in pain."

Here it went. Harry, for once, had to give Sirius advice. He opened his mouth and made a weak noise. "I," he said eventually.

Sirius raised an eyebrow.

Harry swallowed. "I love you too. Please look after yourself, I don't know what I'd do without you." It had all come very quick, gabbled in a high pitch, but after a moment, Sirius lowered his eyes, and smiled.

For once, Sirius had nothing to say. Rather than waste his breath, he simply wrapped an arm around his Godson – his _son_, why not? – and snuggled the slight boy up to his side.


End file.
